Page 2 of Crash Landed with My Weredragon

"There's life out there," Athena announced, dropping into a chair in the briefing room. Peter stood behind her, looking pale. The two security officers flanked the door, still gripping their weapons.

"What kind of life?"

"The bad kind. We found these worm-looking things near the vents. Tube worms, maybe, about a yard long. They spit acid, Marina. Actual acid. Peter's boot is half-dissolved."

Peter held up the boot in question. The sole was eaten through, the edges still smoking faintly. "It barely missed my foot," he confirmed. He was trying to sound calm. He wasn't succeeding.

"Are they aggressive?"

"They didn't chase us. They seemed territorial; stay away from the vents and they leave you alone. But there were a lot of them, and they were big. The ones near the sulfur vents were the worst."

"Anything else?"

"Water. Sort of. There's a depression about four hundred yards northwest that has standing liquid. I wouldn't drink it without testing, but it's there. And..." Athena hesitated.

"And what?"

"I thought I saw something high up in the sky moving fast. Bigger than any bird I've ever seen. Could've been a heat shimmer, but Peter saw it too."

Peter nodded. "I saw it. It was big and it had wings."

The room was quiet for a moment.

Marina looked at each of them. Okafor had joined them by now, his dark face grave. "We're alive. Forty-seven people are depending on us to keep them that way. Athena, I want you to set up a perimeter. Nothing gets within a hundred yards of this ship without us knowing about it. Peter, work with the engineering team on that stabilizer. If we can fix it, we can leave."

"And if we can't?" Peter asked.

"Then we adapt. We find water, we find food, and we survive until rescue comes or we fix the ship ourselves. This isn't the first time humans have crash-landed somewhere hostile."

"It's the first time we've crash-landed on an alien planet with acid-spitting worms and something with wings," Athena pointed out.

"Then we'll be pioneers. Put it on your resume." Marina turned to her console. The humor was thin, but it was all she had. Fear would come later, in the dark, when she was alone. Right now, she had work to do.

She activated the ship-wide channel. "All crew, this is Marina Livingstone. We've completed an initial surface survey. Ceylara is habitable but hostile. Department heads will meet in the briefing room in thirty minutes. Until then, stay inside the ship. I repeat, stay inside."

She released the channel. Steady voice, and calm delivery. Forty-seven people drawing comfort from the steadiness. That was the burden of being in charge. People trusted you, and then you had to earn it.

Through the viewport, the twin suns of Ceylara blazed down on red rock and acid-spitting creatures and a world that didn't want them there. Marina intended to survive it anyway.

* * *

The department heads filed into the briefing room looking exactly the way Marina expected: scared and trying not to show it. Dr. Vasquez from medical had her tablet clutched to her chest like a shield. Engineering Chief Rowan was already talking numbers under his breath; fuel consumption, structural integrity, repair timelines. The biologist, Dr. Patel, kept glancing at the viewport as if something might come through the glass at any moment.

Marina had spent the last eight minutes organizing her data into something that resembled a plan. It wasn't a great plan. But it was better than no plan, and right now that was the bar.

"Here's what we know," she began. "We're on Ceylara, designated Red Wall 7 in the exploration database. It's uncharted, which means nobody's been here before us and nobody knows we're here. The ship sustained damage to the port stabilizer during landing. Chief Rowan?"

"It's fixable," Rowan said. He was a large man with careful hands and a voice that always sounded like he was delivering bad news, even when he wasn't. "But I need parts we don't have. The stabilizer's main coupling sheared clean through. I can jury-rig a temporary fix, maybe, but it won't hold through atmospheric exit. We need proper materials."

"What kind of materials?"

"Metal alloy of a specific grade. We might find something compatible on the surface, but I'd need to test it. Could take days or weeks."

The room absorbed this quietly.

"The surface environment is hostile but survivable," Marina continued. "Breathable air, extreme heat, sulfuric vent activity. Dr. Patel, what can you tell us about the wildlife?"

Patel cleared her throat. She was a small woman who spoke in precise sentences and who had, Marina knew, a background in xenobiology that was about to become spectacularly relevant. "Based on Athena's recon data, we're looking at a primarily volcanic ecosystem. The tube worms near the vents appear to be the dominant surface fauna. They're chemosynthetic; they feed on sulfur compounds, not sunlight. The acid spit is a defense mechanism, likely evolved against predators."